A Free-Market Energy Blog

Surge Pricing, Not ‘Price Gouging’ (an economist’s protest)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 12, 2020

All told, it is cheaper to surge price than have consumers worry and waste the most precious and depleting commodity of all, a person’s time.

The free market is needed even more in an emergency than in normal times. In the current Pandemic, a run on toilet paper and paper towels occurred as consumers stocked up in the fear that shortages would persist. Back in the 1970s, gasoline and other petroleum products, underpriced by federal law, caused shortages where consumers repeatedly topped off their tanks in long gasoline lines at the service station.

Surge pricing (the proper term for ‘price gouging’) is needed from time to time to save consumers from themselves. Increasing prices to the point that consumers know that there will be supply at the store prevents panic buying, not to mention the worry and lost time hunting for uncertain supply.…

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Inferior, Subsidized Energy Feels the Pain

By -- May 11, 2020

Paul Gaynor, CEO of Longroad Energy, a utility-scale wind and solar developer, recently said, “Pre-pandemic, there were great dreams and aspirations for a record-setting year.” Indeed, the renewable industry was well on its way this year to a new record: the $9 billion subsidy mark. Mr. Gaynor’s dreams and those of the industry are a burden to the rest of us.

Without the subsidies, it is almost certain [that wind and solar] would be only a niche industry, supplying perhaps a percent or two of our power, rather than the 26% it is currently supplying in Texas.

For the first time last year, electricity produced from wind in Texas almost equaled the amount produced from coal. This year, it appears as if wind is going to blow coal away.

Last year, each source produced about 20% of the electricity used on the grid.…

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A Malthusian Confronts Renewables (review of ‘Planet of the Humans’)

By Sherri Lange -- May 7, 2020

“Anti-mineral-energy Big Green has been hoisted by its own petard.”

“Solar and wind cannot replace fossil fuels. They are intermittent and always need to be backed up with non-renewable sources. In the case of solar and wind factories, the process of building, maintaining, and rapid replacement is overwhelmingly irresponsible, destructive, and short sighted.”

Ronald Reagan said back in 1964:

… anytime you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we’re denounced as being against their humanitarian goals. They say we’re always “against” things — we’re never “for” anything. Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant; it’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.”

Would you like to see a documentary chronicling “what isn’t so”? Check out the multi-million-view U-Tube sensation, Planet of the Humans by “equal opportunity offender” Michael Moore (with producer Jeff Gibbs).…

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Houston Chronicle vs. Petroleum: The Latest

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 6, 2020
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Linowes on a 13th Extension of the Wind PTC (crony coronas exposed)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 5, 2020
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Energy & Environmental Newsletter: May 4, 2020

By -- May 4, 2020
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Antitrust Protectionism: Domestic Independent Producers Charge “Dumping” against Oil Imports

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 30, 2020
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“Petroentrepreneurs” are Environmentalists Too (DEPA tribute rings true)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 29, 2020
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Robert Bryce: Guilty as Charged (DeSmog hit piece boomerangs)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 28, 2020
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Wind Power: Subsidy after Subsidy after Subsidy ….

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 27, 2020
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